


the great attractor (and gravity binds me to you)

by flailingthroughsanity



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Deconstruction, Existential Angst, Happy Ending, Introspection, M/M, Reality Bending, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-14 00:44:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17498423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flailingthroughsanity/pseuds/flailingthroughsanity
Summary: Takashi Shirogane walks through existence and reality, traipsing where the lines are blurred. Akira is an anomaly, and Keith is a ghost.





	the great attractor (and gravity binds me to you)

**Author's Note:**

> A little fic I drew up from somewhere today. Akira Kogane, or Akira from Defenders of the Universe/Beast King GoLion (1981), is, of course, a reference and spiritual predecessor to Keith from Legendary Defender, and I love using him/referencing to him in some of my fics.
> 
> Partially inspired by [A Tale for the Time Being](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15811545-a-tale-for-the-time-being).

Akihabara is an electric zoo; the bustling underbelly of a metropolitan giant. Its streets are lined with neon-coloured storefronts, flashing in an almost eerie pattern, pandering to the desires of the everyday citizen looking for their own little paradise. The district is an almost ungodly cross of East and West — it’s wide flat screens playing the repetitive anime commercials, standees upon standees of every comic book (both Japanese and American made) and the occasional maid café, with their frilly black and white uniform, calling out to interested customers in dark suits, asking them to stay and try their menu out. It’s a vivacious place — vivacious in the sense that Akihabara never seems to settle. Hours can pass from sundown and crowds still tread through the streets, the occasional Westerner unfortunately lost — or in some cases, those desperate to disappear.   
  
Standing by a surprisingly empty alley, shadowed in spite of the artificial lighting flooding the streets, Shiro lets the cigarette drop from his lax fingers and surreptitiously puts it out with his shoe. He still tastes the nicotine and tar in his mouth and he cherishes it for that one moment. When he removes his shoe, he still sees the Marlboro butt and, knowing the Japanese penchant for cleanliness (and not wanting to bring attention to himself), Shiro sighs and bends down to pick the butt up.   
  
He holds it in his hand for a moment — not bothered by the fact that he just stepped on it — and with a single, almost unconscious thought, the butt flashes and flickers and he sees tiny bright dots and pitch-black darkness covering the cigarette. A flash, and the cigarette is gone. No trace is left.   
  
It did not even take a second. Shiro knows that.   
  
Shiro walks through existence and reality, traipsing where the lines are blurred. He doesn’t know when it started – or even how it started. For one time in his life, he was normal. Funny, when he looks back on it, it almost seems strange and unfamiliar. Looking back, it almost seems like a stranger’s lifetime: a normal existence, a normal destiny. Sometimes, it felt like he had stolen someone else’s existence, someone else’s story and that somehow, Shiro was placed inside that body and nothing was normal ever since.   
  
Akihabara continues to bustle, and when Shiro looks at his wristwatch, it flashes a digital 12:43 AM. It is a sleepless district, and Shiro feels a sort of kinship with it, even when he thought it was depressing and discordant - fitting, though, for a man who existed outside existence to feel a connection to a place that seemed to rotate outside time.   
  
Shiro sighs, and puts his hands into the pockets of his coat. He walks into the crowd and he disappears.   
  


* * *

  
  
Reality…is unique.   
  
How do you really validate reality as reality?   
  
Philosophers would say it is how things actually exist or as they are imagined, on whether or not it is observable or comprehensible. Delve into any book by a philosopher — or even merely linked to a philosopher on the basis of reality — and it always comes back to things as it is or has been. Putting it like that, Shiro sometimes wonder if reality is really as it is or just something we tell ourselves to put a meaning to our existence.   
  
He honestly really can’t fault people for it, though. Faced with such an overwhelming field of being, of every little thing in the world, how can anyone not look up and wonder — why am I here? What am I supposed to do? In the face of all of this, am I merely an insignificant speck or do I have a part to play in the grand scheme of things?   
  
It’s the common question asked by philosophers and priests — both seek for meaning, one content with only truth and the other content with faith.   
  
Shiro doesn’t know if he would ever be satisfied with either truth or faith. Perhaps, in a time before, in a different life – he would be. Now, he’s not sure. All he knows is that he is different. He’s not part of reality, he exists outside of it.   
  
Shiro is not sure how he came to that conclusion; and a truth among all truths: he’s not sure of anything anymore.   
  


* * *

  
  
Takashi Shirogane was a normal twenty-three year old. He grew up in a small town, went to high school like the kids in his neighbourhood. He had friends, groups of them — that wasn’t to say that he was popular. He was well-liked, but he had a certain number of people that would greet him in the streets or hung out with him after class. Takashi Shirogane was the picture of normal — he was just like any other person his age.   
  
It was in the early days of September when Shiro noticed the change.   
  
It wasn’t immediate. It was gradual, like an insidious disease that lived under his skin, content to be dormant until it felt it was time to awaken. Slowly and slowly, Shiro started noticing it — and when he started noticing it, everything started changing and he knew he couldn’t hide it anymore. It started out small — sometimes, he’d place something trivial (a pen, a can of soda, his phone) away for a moment and when he would come back to it, it would not be there. At first, he thought it was the typical mistake of a distracted human being: misplace something and you can no longer find it because you’re actively looking for it, and when you’re no longer looking for it — that’s when you find it. Shiro used to file those things away, grounded in the certainty that, one way or another, they’ll always come back. But when days and weeks had passed, and he started losing more things and none of them returning — he knew something was up.   
  
He thought theft, that maybe someone was stealing his stuff. He thought of his brother, Ryou, and he confronted the younger about it.   
  
“Have you seen my phone?” He asked, leaning on the doorsill of Ryou’s bedroom. He watched his brother turn from his laptop, swiveling on his chair. Dark eyes greeted his beneath black-rimmed glasses.   
  
“Hey, man.” Ryou greeted, pushing his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. “I haven’t seen it, why?”   
  
Shiro shrugged. “I don’t know where it is, thought you might have. How about my comic books — the Junji Ito one?  _ The Face Burglar _ one?”   
  
Ryou shrugged. Shiro frowned. “Are you sure? I remember lending it to you once.”   
  
His brother mirrored his expression. “I’m sure I gave it back to you. I don’t steal things.”   
  
It was a bit defensive, but Shiro had let it slide that night. When his brother had gone out early for school, Shiro had snuck into his room and started opening drawers and cabinets. He found sketchbooks, old and new, a few discarded camera casings and even a really old family picture — but when it was almost three in the afternoon and his brother was coming home, Shiro still hadn’t found anything.   
  
That night he had fallen asleep with his hand on his pillow. When he woke, the pillow was gone.   
  


* * *

  
  
It’s counting down to the New Year, the waning days of two thousand sixteen heralding in a snow-covered storm. Shiro is sitting in a café in Akihabara. It’s one of the more quiet ones, subdued — there’s no gimmick or theme going on: just a regular coffeeshop in palettes of brown and black. There’s a slight drizzle outside, the rain drops trickling on the glass surface of the windows. It’s quite cold, actually, but Shiro makes do with his coat, wrapping it tighter around himself. The steam from his coffee adds to the warmth, and he leans forward a bit just to inhale some of the fragrance.   
  
When one of the baristas walked by his aisle and asked if he would like something to eat, Shiro leans back a bit, ensuring his hands are nowhere near her (or any part of her he could accidentally touch). He’s learned his lesson — and he’ll never forget it.   
  
The barista leaves, and Shiro lets himself breathe in relief.   
  
He resumes staring through the window, watching it being covered in frost and rain, and the sky is a dark grey — almost stormy, tumultuous. Outside, he sees crowds and throngs of people running, umbrellas up in the air. For some of them, who were not lucky enough to have the foresight to bring umbrellas, coats and bags are strewn in the air as they braved the December cold.   
  
The café doors open — it’s hard not to notice, the place seems to appeal to a more vintage look (a pretty generic theme, Shiro notes) and the wooden doors creak when they are moved. He turns his head a bit, and looks at the newcomer.   
  
The man is wrapped in a coat, a dark color that suits his almost fair features. His hair is a dark shade of brown, and a pointed nose. He’s not someone Shiro would call unearthly beautiful (unlike his brother, Ryou, who seemed to have gotten the best out of their gene pool) but he was certainly someone who turned heads, even if just in an appreciating manner.   
  
The man goes to the counter and stands in line to order; Shiro takes the time to peruse through the café and he realizes that it’s more or less full. From the quiet, it’s almost like he was the only one there but when he turns his gaze around once more, Shiro realizes with a growing dread that the only available chair is the one across the table. He had taken the table, fit for two, content with only being there for a moment until the rain had started and looking to the growing frost outside, Shiro was not in the mood to run back to his apartment and risk freezing to death.   
  
The very best he could hope for was that the man would order and have it to-go instead.   
  
His hopes are dashed as the barista hands him a tray, a slice of cake on a plate (damn it, Shiro thinks) and a tall cup.   
  
The newcomer looks around, and Shiro can tell from afar that he starts looking dismayed at all the occupied table until he makes eye contact and Shiro has to stop himself from gasping aloud.   
  
Piercing dark eyes lock with his. Shiro doesn’t know why he feels like he is being inspected, being mentally torn apart but Shiro feels all his defense going haywire and his hands start to sweat.   
  
Shiro wants to make himself look intimidating and standoffish, but it’s a bit difficult with how flustered he feels like — he’s still unsure as to why he even feels flustered in the first place. The newcomer either is oblivious, or he doesn’t care, because a second later he’s slowly making his way to Shiro’s table, sidestepping a few chairs.   
  
Up close, Shiro notes that he really is short, and that he has the features of a man whose attractiveness depends on the day. Not to say that he’s common, but certainly not someone that would look perfect all the time. The newcomer smiles a small smile at him and Shiro feels his hands sweat even more.   
  
“Hi,” the newcomer’s voice is deep, but soft — it’s a pleasant sound to listen to, even in heavily accented English. “This is really awkward, but is it okay if I share your table? We don’t have to talk or anything, and I’ll be as quick as possible.”   
  
Shiro wants to say no. He really doesn’t want to share his table — he’s been content being by himself and he wants to continue being content by himself, having someone nearby would ruin that.   
  
“Yeah, not a problem,” Shiro answers instead, noting his own accented speech. He doesn’t know why. “I’m Shiro.”   
  
He also doesn’t know why he gave the stranger his name.   
  
Smile growing a tad bigger, the newcomer sets his tray on the table and Shiro moves his cup. Settling on the seat across the table, Shiro oddly feels like he’s on a date.   
  
“I’m Akira, by the way.” The man — Akira, Shiro rolls it out in his mind, likes how it sounds — says. Light, though the fair skin and the dark hair contrasted softly, what with the grey light slipping in. Akira reaches out a hand and grabs his cup and brings it close, taking a sip. Shiro watches him, face a bit pale from the cold, hair falling into his eyes. He looks young, a little innocent even.   
  
“On vacation or work?” Shiro asks in his mother tongue, and Akira looks pleasantly surprised.   
  
The other smiles as he picks up the fork and cuts a small bit for himself. “Vacation.I’ve only been here two days. I wasn’t ready for the weather at all.”   
  
A laugh, a bit self-deprecating but all in good jest, and Shiro hums, taking in the curl of the other’s mouth as he smiles.   
  
“I’ve been here two years and I’m still not used to the weather.” He suddenly says, still unsure as to where his normally reticent self has gone. Shiro can oftentimes last months without talking to another person (outside the customary “excuse me” and other polite exchanges when he goes out to buy food). He doesn’t know why sitting across Akira, subtly watching the way his hair falls into his eyes, makes him want to change that.   
  
He’s said it in his usual deadpan tone, not intending for humor but Akira chuckles anyway. It sounds warm, genuine and hearing it, Shiro fights the urge to smile. Even a little.   
  
“Well, at least you look ready for it.” Akira answers back, eyes breaking away from Shiro to look at his coat. He raised a hand and tapped his own coat. “This was an emergency purchase, I had to or else I would have frozen to death twenty minutes ago.”   
  
The thought is a bit amusing, or so Shiro rationalizes as he lets one corner of his lip up at Akira’s words.   
  
Silence follows Akira’s last statement but Shiro finds it’s not uncomfortable. The last time Shiro was with someone else and their conversation had died, it felt stifling, awkward and deafening. That was also the last time Shiro ever bothered to be in contact with another human being for longer than what’s necessary. With this stranger across him, it’s not awkward. He doesn’t feel like he has to pepper the silence with conversation. It’s weird and unusual but Shiro doesn’t feel like questioning it (although he has done some pretty questionable things today).   
  
“So,” and for someone who said they wouldn’t need to talk, Akira is chatty (and Shiro frustratingly notes that he is not frustrated at all — frustrated with himself, yes, but not with Akira for opening a conversation). “You’ve been here two years?”   
  
Shiro nods. “I moved here around November, two years ago, but I actually started living here a month later. It was actually around this time, now that I think about it.”   
  
“For work or for personal reasons?” Akira asks, eyes curious and Shiro notes the way the orange lamplight of the café shines in his dark eyes.   
  
“Personal reasons.” Shiro says — and for the first time in two years, he’s broaching a subject he once thought he had left dead. It had been dead, he recalls. He left it dead for a reason, but Akira’s question is skirting around the topic and Shiro feels himself closing in, even when a traitorous part of him wants to tell Akira everything.   
  
Maybe it’s because Akira’s a stranger — someone he literally does not know, someone who doesn’t know his past, who he is, what he is. Yet, at the same time, it feels like Akira is someone who knows him, as well. Feels like Akira can look into his gaze and see all the secrets he’s buried years ago.   
  
“How’s Tokyo so far?” Shiro asked, shifting the subtle topic. Outside, the rain has strengthened, the droplets sliding rapidly down the glass. He’s glad he isn’t outside.   
  
“It’s been eventful, lots of things to see.” The other man answers.   
  
“Is this your first time?” A nod. Shiro hums.   
  
The silence resumes and Shiro looks up to find Akira already looking back at him. Shiro fights the urge to shiver at the directness of those eyes looking at him. The other man has the appearance of someone he could very well pass by the street and not notice but that gaze was deeply staggering – Shiro felt completely naked under Akira’s gaze. It was disconcerting, to say the least.   
  
A compulsion hits Shiro. It’s out of the blue, hot and heavy. Looking at Akira looking back at Shiro has him opening his mouth and asking a question that he would rather have not voiced in the first place.   
  
“Do you believe in magic?”   
  
Akira cocks his head, curious and a bit confused on the topic change. “What?”   
  
“Magic.” Shiro repeats, hating the word but finding no other way to simply describe the things he could do.   
  
“Magic,” Akira repeats. “Like magic tricks and cards and doves and that kind of shit?”   
  
Shiro shakes his head. Akira doesn’t sound disbelieving or annoyed, he sounds curious and a little bewildered. “No…magic as in, magical powers. Things that you only read about in fiction or see in movies.”   
  
A small furrow of the brows. “Like mind reading, superpowers and that stuff?”   
  
Shiro nods, understanding how stupid it sounds. Comic book superpowers are called that way simply because they are what they are: comic book super powers. Unreal. Nonexistent.   
  
“Um…no, I guess? But when I was young, I thought I could move things with my mind if I just thought really hard.” Akira answers, still confused but he lets out an unsure smile.   
  
Shiro nods, unsurprised. It was the answer he expected, the answer he’s told himself all these years, but it still feels a little disheartening hearing it from someone else, someone normal.   
  
Another question comes to mind and Shiro blurts it out before he feels too embarrassed about it.   
  
“What about reality?”   
  
“What about it?”   
  
“Do you think…do you think people can change reality?”   
  
The question is followed by a bout of silence and Shiro wonders if Akira think he’s weird for asking a complete stranger these kinds of questions. When Akira answers, his voice is unsure and he’s breaching it softly, slowly. “I…I think you can.”   
  
Shiro looks at him. Akira looks back. “How?”   
  
Akira fidgets under Shiro’s stare, but he doesn’t look away. “Well, reality is what we make it, right?”   
  
Shiro slowly nods, silently asking the other man to continue. Akira seems to bolster himself and sits up, one hand slowly cutting another slice before silently pushing the plate to Shiro. He shakes his head in thanks.   
  
“I mean — reality is everything. It’s what we do, what we think, what we feel. If you want to do something, you go do it and it becomes real. The same goes when you feel something — if you feel it, it’s real enough right? I mean, I’d like to think it does.”   
  
Shiro understands this — it’s the basic concept of what reality is. It’s a general understanding, yet strangely idealistic and optimistic. He’s a bit surprised — he hasn’t thought of reality this positively since then, since from before. “And you can change it that way? Just as simple as that?”   
  
“I guess so. It is what it is, so if you think otherwise, then that goes for you.” Akira looks up at Shiro beneath his fringe. “Is there a reason why I feel like I’m taking a philosophy class?”   
  
He jokes, and Shiro smiles a bit, amused.   
  
“It’s a long story.” He shrugs, reaching out to grab his cup and take a sip. It’s grown cold, but Shiro doesn’t mind. He’s grown fondly of cold things.   
  
Akira turns his head to look outside, Shiro follows and watches the mixture of rain and hail. It was hell to be out on an evening like this. The other turns back to him. “I have enough time.”   
  
Shiro looks down at his cup, knows that he should feel unsettled about the topic but he doesn’t. He only feels unsettled under Akira’s gaze, but for once, Shiro is fine with it. He’s disappeared so many times, it feels odd to finally be in someone’s gaze for an extended period of time.   
  
He looks back outside, watching the droplets chase each other in a web-like fashion. “Do you really?”   
  
Akira makes a questioning noise.   
  
“Do you really have enough time?”   
  


* * *

  
  
In astronomy and astrophysics, the Great Attractor was a gravitational anomaly — a cosmic pool of mass at the center of a distant galaxy, pulling all matter to its core. Some astrophysicists argued that at the center is a pit of gravity so intense and so dense, it was something akin to a black hole, in a scale far larger than anyone can ever imagine. Others argued that it was a simple condensation of matter, and just like our own Sun, galaxies across the observable universe will just rotate round it.   
  
Shiro fancies the idea of a central black hole — that slowly, very slowly, the entire universe would soon compress itself into a singularity. All existence denied.   
  
It was a depressing thought, he realized — he understands that. It’s not the kind of things a twenty-year old music major would think about, not the things a person would lay awake at night just to contemplate, holding his hand aloft and watch as matter flashed and disappeared around his fingers. There was something poetic in the idea that, in spite of the universe being created out of an outward explosion of cosmic energy — it would all come to an end, collapsing on itself: reverting, vacuuming, compressing into a single point.   
  
Shiro often wonders — what happens to that singularity?   
  
Will it persist in time — will time even exist when all existence is denied? — floating in the center of non-existence, revolving on itself, the central formula of life nestled within its core? Or, as fantastic as the idea is, will that singularity soon overload on itself, exploding outward, cosmic energy reining back the stars and all of reality back to its infinite backdrop — like a cycle, the universe born anew?   
  
“Would you want it to go on, though?” Akira asks, setting his cup down.   
  
Shiro blinks. “I’m sorry?”   
  
It was Akira’s turn to hum. “Do you? Do you want existence to go on? Or are you content with the idea of everything that makes us everything return to nothing?”   
  
Shiro looks down, unsure. No one’s ever asked him that question, before. To be fair, no one has ever heard him speak aloud the thoughts that cloud his mind through the nights — to more nights than he can possibly afford, spent awake and in deep contemplation. In these nights, when the streetlight cuts into his bedroom window, he would often turn his head to look through the glass and see the skyscrapers through Shibuya — sees the tall apartments and condominiums and he would think to himself:   
  
What do normal people think of? What do normal people dream of? When they in bed at night, in that state between consciousness and the sleep, what comes to their mind? Would it be the day they had gone through — perhaps the friends they had met before, the family they shared meals with? Perhaps, it would be the ever-pressing responsibilities that come with civilization and society: taxes, bills, the mail left inside the mailbox, the dress down at Shinjuku, the pet they had forgotten to feed; normal, trivial things — these are things that never seem to hold any semblance of significance to Shiro.   
  
It must be nice, he thinks, to have those kinds of concerns. Mundane, ordinary, dull. It must be nice — but these are normal people, these are for individuals that have their own sets of responsibilities. None of them have the fear that a simple touch could return them to zero, the fear that they were a walking weapon in itself, a weapon unwilling to be a weapon, a destroyer in a bone-made prison, swathed in sinews and veins, painted in flesh — baptized a name, an existence he honestly felt he didn’t deserve.   
  
“I…don’t know,” Shiro admits. “I’ve never really thought about it.”   
  
“Huh? Why not? Regardless of your choice, it would very much affect you.” Akira answers and as if realizing his own words, he presses on. “Well, logically, we’d probably be dead or have decomposed by the time that happens, but you know what I mean. More or less, a part of you would carry on in your children or in your family, and when the time comes that you know happens, it’s still affecting you. Technically.”   
  
Shiro admits to finding Akira incessantly cute when he rambles. There’s something innocent and wholly mesmerizing in the way the other man’s eyes roam all over the place as he tries to find the right words to express his ideas, hands waving a bit, his whole body moving in one way or other. He finds it incredibly and endearingly adorable, and he hopes he doesn’t look as flustered as he feels with the realization.   
  
“I’ve never really thought about it, about my part in all of this. Thinking about it, it’s not even a big part,” Shiro chuckles at his own words. “I guess I’ve always believed I existed beyond that.”   
  
Akira follows suit in chuckling. “Well, normally, if I ever hear something like that from a complete stranger, that would be my cue to politely thank them for their time, slowly back away and maybe call the police.”   
  
Shiro wears an amused smile on his lips — he can’t seem to see an end to how many times Akira continues to amuse him — even though the thought of the police showing up should send him into a panic, it doesn’t. Somehow, Akira does that to him. “And what about now? Not feeling up to calling the police?”   
  
Akira winks at him. Shiro’s heart skips a beat.   
  
“I would be very disappointed if they came by and take you away from me right now.”   
  


* * *

  
  
“I have powers.” Shiro says, suddenly. It’s the first thing he’s said in the last ten minutes of silence — the last breaths of their conversation consisting of chuckles and joking threats of calling the police. Akira doesn’t look surprised, merely looks away from the window and looks into his eyes. He doesn’t look amused — the way Shiro would expect if he ever said something like that to someone else, maybe waiting for a punchline or something. He doesn’t look annoyed — something he’d expect Ryou or his parents to look like if he ever brought that up during dinner. He looks contemplative, like he’s taking in Shiro’s words seriously and as if he’s waiting for an explanation.   
  
Shiro knows that this is the last thing he should be doing — that this is exactly the reason why he continually runs off to disappear, how home no longer resembled a small town, two parents and a brother. This secret he holds, it has been the reason for his unending pilgrimage; his home, a temporary shelter that expires at the end of a year.   
  
He knows that Akira should be the last person on Earth he should be opening this to; that the people who should be the first to know are back in Toyama, probably still worried, probably thinking he’s dead, that he’s gone — or maybe they’re still keeping the memory of their son alive. Shiro doesn’t know. He likes to think that his parents and brother have buried the hatchet and thought him dead — he doesn’t want them to waste their lives hurting, worrying, wondering. They’re better off without him.   
  
But he wants to — he dearly, desperately wants to tell Akira.   
  
Shiro wishes he could lie to himself and make an excuse as to why he’s not afraid to tell Akira — but lying to himself is something Shiro would never do, not because he can’t do it. No, he is always honest with himself simply because he has no one else to be honest to. The only person remaining in his corner was himself, and Shiro honestly can’t find a reason — at least not one that did not sound extremely idealistic and naïve — as to why he’s not afraid to tell Akira.   
  
“I don’t know how it happened. One day, I was normal. And then the next, I wasn’t anymore.”   
  
As if sensing a long tale, Akira nods, and he places his hands on the desk and his eyes don’t look away from Shiro’s.   
  


* * *

  
  
When Shiro had first started noticing things were disappearing around him — and the accompanying realization that it was all because of him, it took him days to accept it. He had thought himself insane, that maybe he was under some psychological condition that made him envision these things happening around him. He told himself — or tried to convince himself that it was something psychological — perhaps a disorder undiscovered, a condition that he was unfortunate to be born with, or that maybe he just woke up one day and snapped. He thought to himself, tried to find a justifiable reason as to why he would see these things, how holding a pen and a simple, unexplainable thought would cause the pen to light up and disappear in his grasp.   
  
The first time it happened, seeing the thing fading into nothing in a flash and whirl of light, it took Shiro all he had to close his mouth and not scream.   
  
There was no explanation for his condition. A hundred webpages on Naver, even on Google, yielded no results. All the books he could find in the city library never mentioned a single whiff of his condition — if it even existed in history, that is.   
  
His powers — his condition — had no pattern when they first manifested. He would touch a pen and it would disappear, he’d then grab a book and stare in frustration as the book remained as solid as ever, existing in the real world, feeling the leather cover in his grasp. He then had touched a hundred other things after — when he reached the twentieth item on his list, still in his solid grasp, he wondered if it was a fluke. Then he had grabbed the next item and watched in half-amazement, half-horror as it flashed in bright light and disappeared. Shiro was forced to confront the fact that it was no fluke, and that he had no idea how to control it.   
  
Then, over time, he found the solution. After days of notoriously and adamantly refusing to touch anything — in spite of his family and friends’ growing suspicion — he found it: a pattern. A pattern did exist and it only took him months to realize it was there all along: it was thought.   
  
Cognition.   
  
It wasn’t a single idea, or a single thought, that acted as the switch for it. No, it was more than a simple thought — more an action of thought than the thought itself — it was a combination of ideas, perhaps bound and locked to all the synapses and energy localized in his brain (a few medical books often dealt with the untapped potential of the human brain). Shiro doesn’t know how to put it into words, but more or less, he was controlling it by controlling the idea of control.   
  
“How did you know that it was actually you controlling it by thinking you were controlling it?” Akira asks, interrupting Shiro. A thump on the glass and both turned to see a woman under an umbrella walk past the café, the straps of her bag hitting the glass wall.   
  
“It’s funny, because if I think about it — it’s hard to explain.” Shiro laughs, a little on the quiet side, a little disbelieving. “It’s like trying to describe a color; in your head, you know what it is, you know how it is. When you think of the colour red, even though you don’t or can’t find the right words to express what red is — you just know. I think the same thing happens when I think of it, of this condition I have. It’s less action and more of thought, your understanding of it. I mean, how do you even quantify thought?”   
  
“I’m the wrong person to ask,” Akira smiles. “I don’t have answer for you. Not yet, at least. But to your…powers, now that you’ve found a way to manipulate it — shouldn’t that have made things easier?”   
  
A sardonic laugh bubbles out of Shiro’s lips before he can control himself. “You think it would have, but like everything, there’s always a catch.”   
  
A frown. Akira cocks his head. “What’s the catch?”   
  
“I can’t touch people.”   
  
“You can’t touch people?” Akira repeated.   
  
Shiro shakes his head. “I can’t. With inanimate objects, I can manipulate it. But when someone touches me, or when I reach out to touch someone, my…curse goes haywire.”   
  
An oppressive silence occupies the space between them right after Shiro’s words, and the man doesn’t know if he wants to look up into the other’s eyes. The bustling outside had grown stronger, and he sees flocks of people running down the street just outside the café. The rain has grown stronger.   
  
“Who did you touch, Shiro?” Akira asks, and Shiro closes his eyes as an onslaught of emotions ran through his veins.   
  


* * *

  
  
His name was Keith.   
  
He was from Shiro’s hometown of Toyama, a year younger and more flame than human. Toyama is a small city — not to say it was a town, a place where everyone knew everyone, but it was a lot smaller than Yokohama or Tokyo. If someone became moderately popular, it wouldn’t be a surprise to know about that person from his friends or from his school. Every time a varsity team goes out and plays against another (maybe from a school in the same city or from a different place altogether), mostly everyone would hear about it. It was a serene place, its charm lulled by mountain ranges and forest air.   
  
Keith Kogane was one of the more popular students. He was handsome, with thick brows and a fanged smile, he was notorious for his wit and sarcasm and his popularity could be credited to his skill in dancing. He was the type of student that the girls would flock together and coo at from afar, and Shiro was not ashamed to say that he did find the younger student attractive although their circles never overlapped with one another’s.   
  
Ironic that he first met Keith in a studio down Seventh Street. Shiro, although not known for his looks, also had a mark in the high school popularity ladder — he did have a band back then, and they used to play for school activities and performances. As the vocalist, it wasn’t surprising that he was placed in the spotlight more than his other members did — Shiro admitted to liking the attention, but he was nowhere as popular as Keith, whose dance moves earned him sobriquets and awards in city-wide contests.   
  
He remembered the surprise he felt when he ran into the dancer as he was making his way home from the studio he used to work part-time at. It was more of a cross between a studio and a dance hall, where one side was cordoned off for musicians wanting to practice their instruments, and the other were somewhat spacious rooms for those wanting to rent the place out for dance practice. Looking back, he shouldn’t have been surprised, but Shiro had never spoken to Keith, merely stared across the school quadrangle at him but never to be looked back at.   
  
Bumping into the junior, Shiro stopped in his tracks and reached out a hand to steady Keith as he almost collided into him.   
  
“Oh, hey,” Keith exclaimed, surprise dotting his face as he looked up at Shiro. There was a sheen of sweat across his forehead and a faint tangy scent. He probably had come from dance practice, then. “Sorry ‘bout that. You’re Shiro, right? Takashi Shirogane?”   
  
He nodded. “That’s me.”   
  
“Hi.” A hand out and Shiro reaches out to grasp Keith’s hand in a firm shake. “Nice to meet you here. I’m a big fan.”   
  
Shiro felt himself flushing, feeling oddly pleased at hearing ‘words. “Oh? Um, thank you? I guess.”   
  
“Yeah. I’m Keith, from Class 3A.”   
  
I know, Shiro wanted to say. He didn’t though, it was a bit creepy.   
  
Then, as if realizing he was holding Shiro up, Keith jumped a bit and let go of Shiro’s hand. The senior felt oddly bereft at the thought. “Were you going home? I guess I’ll see you around then.”   
  
With a wave and small smile, eyes wide under his fringe, Keith gave a small bow and skirted around Shiro. The other turned his head, watching the younger student walk away and he didn’t know where this feeling of fondness just came from.   
  
In the present, Shiro smiles to himself. Ever since that day, Keith started carving himself more and more into Shiro’s life.   
  


* * *

  
  
“Shut up.” Keith said, a faint glimmer of annoyance across his eyes. Shiro merely chuckled and patted the dancer on the back.   
  
“Well, we can finally say that nobody is perfect, not even the notorious Keith Kogane.”   
  
It was a Saturday, slow and sunny and Shiro and Keith had decided to hang out at a nearby teahouse. They had originally planned to hang out at the studio, but with the district power out — and knowing it would be stifling inside — they simply made a detour and, ten minutes later, they were on the outside tables, drinks in hand and singing aloud to the tea house’s Galileo Galilei playlist. Shiro had been pleased to hear the songs, he was a big fan of the band. Keith was familiar with them, but did not actively follow them as strongly as Shiro did — but he did sing along to whatever song he recognized, and when Yuki sung an even higher note, his untrained voice broke and Shiro couldn’t stop himself from guffawing.   
  
Their friendship was easy — ever since that night at the studio, it felt to Shiro like being friends with Keith was something he was meant to do all along. They never fought, and although they sometimes had conflicting ideas, he never felt the need to defend himself. Keith was witty and sarcastic, and he responded well to Shiro’s barbs, even gave some back to him and the musician felt strangely attracted to how someone could be this mouthy.   
  
It didn’t help, though, that the occasional small smiles Keith would send his way — above his drink, or when he’s turning his head or even just their eyes meeting across the school hallway — had Shiro’s heart beating faster and his hands sweating (more than usual).   
  
“You thought I was perfect?” Keith asked, and Shiro choked on his drink. The dancer was also unbelievably observant and Shiro’s little slip had his face flustering, his ears bright red.   
  
“Or so I heard,” That was an excuse, transparent as day, but Shiro was determined not to lose this game.   
  
Keith turned to look at him, and he set his drink down. Slowly, the younger student turned his chair to face Shiro, and he hooked his ankle against Shiro’s, resting it against the table leg. “What about you, man? What do you think?”   
  
Shiro felt very bothered by Keith’s foot against his. “I don’t know. What do you want me to think?”   
  
The dancer leaned closer. “I would really like to kiss you right now.”   
  
“Oh, you do?” Shiro asked, flustered and excited at the same time. He eyed Keith’s fringe, taking in the thick eyebrows, the determined look in his eyes, a smirk on his lips. Sharp features — manlier than Shiro’s — leaning in close and he inhaled Keith’s boyish cologne.   
  
When they swung by the studio later on, Shiro led Keith inside, hand on the wrist. They smiled at the receptionist, Seido, who simply waved them away when they asked to use one of the rooms for something quick. Closing the door, Shiro pushed Keith against the wall and kissed him hard and deep. The dancer whimpered into the kiss, hands clutching Shiro’s arms, body pushing against the other, even when Shiro pushed him back against the wall. Keith’s lips broke away for a moment, just to gasp in a breath and Shiro pressed into him once more, relishing the almost needy way the younger student responded to his kiss. They didn’t have sex there and then — even in the throes of infatuation, neither Shiro nor Keith would risk having Seido (or worse, anyone else) barging into the studio and see them naked, on the floor, possibly in the middle of the act. Not only would it have killed the mood, it would have been deathly embarrassing.   
  
But they do have sex later on, on Shiro’s bed, his house blessedly devoid of people and Shiro found himself incredibly lucky as he trailed kiss after kiss, bite after bite on the inside of Keith’s toned thighs, hearing the pleasured cries of the younger student. Shiro looked up to see him, hands grasping the bedsheets in tight fists, face flushed, mouth open as he moaned. For that one second, seeing Keith in ecstasy because of his own actions — in his own hands — he realized what he felt was more than a passing crush, or a momentary infatuation. If the pleased, content hum in his chest was any indication, Shiro wanted more than this with Keith. He wanted everything. He wanted forever.   
  


* * *

  
  
“You were really happy with him, weren’t you?” Akira asks, eyes bright with understanding and sympathy. Shiro nods, and although his chest thuds at the memory of Keith, he relishes the coursing of joy in his veins, recalling (even for one moment) that singular memory of his ephemeral happiness.   
  
“I loved him. Love. I still do, even today. I…” and Shiro ducks his head a bit, feeling the prick in his eyes. “I had planned out a future with him. We were going to Tokyo, and I would try out playing for a bit and he would study dance. He wanted to become a dance instructor, for theater and for contemporary dance schools. I wanted to play and write songs and…we just really wanted to do the things we loved together.”   
  
Akira is silent, and in a soft voice, ventures out. “But that didn’t happen, did it?”   
  
Shiro looks across the table and watches Akira’s hands holding his cup, fingers short but slender, fair. Nails impeccably trimmed, flushes of pink painting his fingertips from the cold. When was the last time he ever held another person’s hand?   
  


* * *

  
  
Shiro’s phone vibrated and when he looked over and saw Keith’s name flashing on the screen, he turned it over and willed himself to ignore the vibrating device. It’s the ninth time Keith has called in the last hour. Shiro had barely slept in the last two days.   
  
The vibrations stopped. He turned his phone over, there was another message.   
  
PICK UP, PLEASE.   
  
He ignored the text, adding it to the growing pile of dread in the pit of his stomach. It felt endless, abysmal.   
  
His phone vibrated again. Keith was calling once more.   
  
Desperate for it to stop, Shiro grabbed the phone and watched as it flashed bright and before he knew it, he was grasping air. No more vibrations, no more calls, no more messages from a worried boyfriend.   
  
He crossed his arms and sobbed quietly into his arms, wanting nothing more than to call Keith and ask him to save Shiro from himself.   
  


* * *

  
Shiro stopped going to school.   
  
In the morning, he showered and dressed, making sure to avoid touching his parents or Ryou. When his younger brother reached out to hug him, and almost grasped his shoulders, Shiro had backed away, shouting in fear and anger. Ryou jumped, not used to hearing his usually taciturn brother scream at him in fury, and he too backed away, eyes wide.   
  
Shiro ducked his head and ran out of the house, shouting that he was on his way to school.   
  
He didn’t attend his classes. He walked instead, walked to different parts of the city, taking the lonelier, emptier routes. He reached out with a hand and occasionally, he would grasp a fallen leaf or a discarded soda can and, with a thought he cannot break down into something understandable, he would watch it flash and flicker.   
  
Sometimes, he would simply walk and Shiro would see flashes of pinpoint pricks of bright light against a pitch black darkness, sees buildings flash in those colours and when he would blink, the buildings would look normal — concrete, greyed out, dilapidated. He was insane, Shiro was sure. Yet sometimes, he thought he was just as normal as the next person — but he had the touch of something akin to death, to oblivion.   
  
He walked to an abandoned alley, and he smelled the decaying stench of week-old garbage left forgotten. He stared at the bins, and he sees bugs littering on the ground, crawling. Little insects, minute specks of existence and he’s consumed in a dark thought.   
  
Shiro walked closer, ignoring the smell. Kneeling down, he reached out with one hand, fingertip against the shell of the crawling roach. His thoughts are relatively blank, and he watches in amazement — dark, sadistic amazement as the roach flashes white to black and disappears.   
  
Gone.   
  
A thread of life, reality — cut.   
  
Existence, denied.   
  


* * *

  
  
The rain outside had soon faded from a tumult, to a light drizzle. Shiro and Akira both watch as the condensation started to slowly fade, disappearing as warmth overtook cold. Some of the customers had left now that the rain has stopped. Shiro watches as Akira looks to the outside, watches the lamplight reflected in the other’s eyes. “Do you have somewhere to be?”   
  
Akira turns back to him. He shakes his head.   
  
Shiro ponders, for a moment, and decides. “Do you want to walk, or go somewhere private?”   
  
Akira is quiet for a moment. “Are you sure?”   
  
“Positive.”   
  


* * *

  
  
They’re walking down the relatively empty street, Shiro slightly ahead of Akira — almost a meter and a half a distance from each other — the December night chilly. They were in a quieter district, more residential — Shiro looks around, watches the lit windows from the houses. An older woman walks past them on the street, bundled in a coat, a phone against her ear. Shiro watches her from a distance, and he feels Akira following suit.   
  
“Did you ever tell your family or Keith about it?” Akira asks, hands inside the pockets of his coat.   
  
“No,” Shiro answers. “I didn’t want to, and after all this time, I still stand by that decision. They shouldn’t have to be burdened with this.”   
  
“But wasn’t it lonely — to carry all that by yourself, and not tell a single soul?”   
  
Yes, it was lonely. It is lonely. Shiro grows so lonely sometimes that he feels like he’s a gaping black hole, a void sucking in darkness. He sometimes feels out of place, as if he was walking in a plane beyond existence, like he was an invisible stranger, watching people — humanity — go by, living, existing, being real. Sometimes, he got so lonely he would hold himself tight, desperate to ensure that he still existed, even like this, that he was still there, breathing.   
  
“It’s worth it.” Shiro answers.   
  
Akira doesn’t even pause. “Is it?”   
  
“It is,” Shiro responds. “and if it’s not, it has to be. I have to believe that.”   
  


* * *

  
Shiro had underestimated Keith.   
  
With a resounding bang, the dancer knocked the door open, the lock busting out. Shiro stood from the bed, surprise and fear and rage waging a battle inside him — unsure as to how he should feel.   
  
He took in how his boyfriend looked: he looked pale, as if he hadn’t slept as well, eyes red and puffy, breathing hard.   
  
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Keith could have shouted, his voice echoing in the empty house, hoarse and full of rage. Shiro had been prepared for that, steeled himself for how Keith was more flame than man, burning passion on the wick of a candle. He wasn’t prepared for the soft, almost sibilant way he spoke those words, and Shiro felt even more disgusted of himself at hearing the heartbreak, the confusion, the fear in Keith’s voice.   
  
“Shiro, Shiro,” and Shiro does not make eye contact with Keith, doesn’t want to put a face to the miserable, heartbreaking voice calling out for him. “What-what’s wrong? You don’t answer my calls, you don’t answer my messages. You’re always absent.”   
  
Keith stepped closer, just one shaky step and Shiro noticed he was trembling.   
  
He wanted to bolt, or to cry, or to cross the distance, pull Keith into his arms and lock him in his embrace forever. He merely stood still.   
  
“Say something.” Keith asked, voice still quiet, quivering. “Please. Talk to me.”   
  
“Get out.” Shiro whispered, still not looking at Keith.   
  
His boyfriend is silent, save for his breathing, for the tears he was holding back in his throat. “No.”   
  
Keith’s voice is soft, silent — completely unlike how he normally is; confidence and bravado gone, simple honesty faint — but adamant, determined, set.   
  
“Get out.” Shiro repeated, his own voice mechanical, robotic. He sounded dead.   
  
Maybe he had died.   
  
Maybe this was what happened to a consciousness once its host has died.   
  
Maybe. Now was not the right time to be having those thoughts, but Shiro did not bother shielding his mind away from them.   
  
“No.”   
  
“Get. Out.”   
  
“If you would only—“   
  
“Get out, Keith. Don’t come back.”   
  
“Fuck you!” Keith shouted, voice echoing. “Fuck you, Shiro. Fuck you if you think I would up and leave without a single fucking explanation.”   
  
“I DON’T CARE!” Shiro shouts back, anger and fear and the heartbreak of knowing he can never hold Keith again, in the realization that he could never kiss those lips again, wrap his arms around his form and pull him close, trace his jaw with a fingertip — every frustration, every fear Shiro had, condensed into one cry as he shouts again. “GET OUT! GET OUT KEITH AND DON’T COME BACK!”   
  
And in the silence that followed his cry, Shiro prayed. He never believed in anything — not really, content in the idea that destiny was what he made of it — but in that moment, he prayed. He hadn’t asked a specific god, in fact, he asked no gods of his request. In that one moment, he simply asked for Keith to understand — for Keith to go, for him to forget Shiro and move on with his life.   
  
He no longer had a future with Shiro. How do you build a future when a simple caress could spell oblivion? Shiro could no longer lean in close and whisper words of affection against the lobe of Keith’s ears, his lips tracing the shell. Shiro could no longer reach out a hand and grasp Keith’s tightly, squeezing once in appreciation of his talent as the other man stepped out on stage for a performance. Shiro could no longer awaken in bed, arms tight around Keith, watching him sleep and pressing a kiss against his forehead. Shiro could no longer stand before his friends and family, hold Keith’ hand and lean in close to kiss him on the lips — declaring to the world and to anyone that would listen: that Keith was his and that he was Keith’s.   
  
He prayed so hard, so strongly. He had never asked for anything this strongly, this desperately before.   
  
And Keith was shouting, a snarl on his lips, fury and hurt in his eyes and he crossed the distance, a hand grasping Shiro’s shirt, the other poised to punch him across the face.   
  
Shiro, in a daze — shocked and incredibly numb — mindlessly reached out a hand to grasp Keith’s hand clutching his shirt.   
  
Realization struck him then.   
  
With a mouth open in a soundless scream of terror, Shiro watched as Keith froze.   
  
His face paused, still, in fury.   
  
A flicker, Keith’s outline fading for one second — or even less than that — and Shiro saw nebular darkness.   
  


* * *

  
Hours later, when Shiro had screamed himself hoarse — throat burning in pain — he grabbed the bag he had ready under his bed, previously unsure of his decision, and disappeared for the first time in his life. Since then, since that time two years ago, Takashi Shirogane was – by all means – dead.   
  


* * *

  
Having finally spoken the words he had kept to himself in the last two years, Shiro does not feel numb. It’s almost a relief — for one moment, the weight on his shoulders disappeared and he could finally breathe his first breath, unrestrained and deep.   
  
He looks up at the sky, dark, save for the occasional flash of lightning and he lets himself appreciate their beauty, that in spite of their terrifying nature, they were an undeniable part of nature. A force of nature.   
  
Shiro, for the first time, thinks that he may be just that. A force of nature. It’s a stupid thought, but he doesn’t mind the almost exhilarated way his thoughts are going.   
  
Behind him, Akira is silent.   
  
When Shiro turns to peer at him, he expects the man to look aghast or to look shocked. He is neither. He simply stands there, and watches Shiro with a calm gaze, eyes still bright and — were they always that bright, an almost midnight dawn glow to them?   
  
“That’s my story.” Shiro finally says, and he realizes one thing. He doesn’t want to run anymore. He had run, has ran, through days and weeks. He’s gone through cities and villages, used one identity or other, changed the color of his hair and its style. But he has had enough. He’s finally had enough.   
  
He doesn’t know what will happen to him. It’s the first time he hasn’t had a plan set out for himself. He doesn’t want to make one, he doesn’t want to plan his course of action.   
  
He wants to let it all go now.   
  
Shiro decides for himself: enough.   
  


* * *

  
“Do you regret it — regret everything?”   
  
Shiro hums, still looking up at the sky in the silence left in the wake of Akira’s question.   
  
“I do.” Shiro responds, honest, heartfelt. “I regret everything I’ve ever done. I regret everything that I’ve done, every little thing I’ve done that had led me to this point. I regret my choices, my actions, the things I did to keep the people I love safe.”   
  
He pauses.   
  
“I regret them, not because I didn’t want to protect the people I love. I regret them, because I didn’t do it for the people I love. I didn’t run away and hide because I wanted to protect Ryou, to protect Keith,to protect my parents and my friends.”   
  
“Then why did you run?” Akira asks, voice calm, steady.   
  
“I ran because I was afraid. I was afraid of myself…for myself. When I ran away that night, I didn’t do it because I wanted to protect my family — the only people I had left — I did it because I was afraid to face the reality that I did that, afraid to face the truth that it was by my own hand, by my own action. Keith didn’t disappear because he touched me, or that I touched him.   
  
He disappeared because I was too afraid, too scared to trust him. I ran away from my family because I was too afraid, too scared to trust them. To trust them with this dark secret, to trust them with what I had become, to trust them with helping me. I’ve always thought I was protecting them. In the end, I only protected myself.   
  
You don’t hide from the people you love. You don’t run away and leave without a single message, a single note, not even one trace of wherever it is you go. You trust them, you stand by them and hope that they trust you, that they would stand by you.”   
  
He breathes in the scent of grass and rain. “To the people you love, it’s not a question to protect you. It’s a choice, and if you don’t give them that choice — the choice to trust you, and stand by you — how can you honestly say that you are protecting them?”   
  
Shiro finally knows that. He finally understands it, at its core.   
  
He’s been running away, believing in the wrong reasons — content in lying to himself, no matter how unconsciously. He knows that now.   
  
Nodding to himself, like making a promise to his parents, to his brother — to Keith, Shiro stares determinedly at Akira. “I don’t want to run anymore. I want to live.”   
  
“Do you mean that?” Akira asks, voice soft and tender, almost like a silent hiss. He looks ethereal like this, under the faint light of a nearby lamppost, fair skin almost translucent, eyes bright (lilac-mauve) in the nighttime. He’s beautiful, Shiro notes. Like an angel.   
  
“Yes.” And Shiro knows — this is the truth. No more running.   
  


* * *

  
He holds a flower in his hand. In the distant horizon, dawn is slowly opening her gates.   
  
The flower is small — almost as big as his thumbnail. Faint pink tips trace its petals, a bud of gold in the center. The petals sway in the wind, almost closing on itself — protecting her core. It was miraculous, Shiro thinks. He knows, with the winter season, that this flower could never bloom, not in frost, miles away from where she was born. It was miraculous — Shiro starts to believe that. Miracles happen. Miracles do happen.   
  
He turns, and he shows Akira the flower.   
  
The other smiles, lilac-mauve eyes twinkling as he looks at the lotus flower.   
  
Then — deciding — Shiro thinks. He thinks. He thinks of a thousand trivial items, all long gone. He thinks of a stray insect, a press of the fingertip, existence denied. He thinks of Keith and he thinks of him in all frames of reality, in every second of his existence, recalling, remembering: Keith, frozen in anger; Keith, mouth open in pleasure; Keith, a bold smirk on his lips; Keith, sweat dotting his forehead, eyes bright as he looks up at Shiro. He remembers Keith in every facet that Shiro could remember, in every flicker and tendril, every permutation of reality.   
  
The lotus flower glows — it doesn’t flash bright — it glows, and nebular darkness seep across her thin petals, but Shiro isn’t noticing that. He’s looking through the darkness, and he sees it.   
  
A mosaic, a cosmic web in bright pinpoints, lines of white, yellow and red — every colour imaginable — linking to one another, over and over, tendrils of light growing stronger as they oscillate and compress.   
  
Over and over and over.   
  
And he feels, more than sees, the pulsing of life — of what is real — in the thread of all light, and it feels like it’s coursing through his veins, a beating heart in the center of all possibility.   
  
Creation, not destruction.   
  
Shiro blinks, eyes pricking with something close to happiness, to something good, something pure. The lotus grows smaller and smaller, until it compresses into a single point of light, floating, resting against his palm.   
  
The light flashes, in almost something like joy — Shiro knows the idea is laughable — and it fades to nothing.   
  
His hand remains outstretched, palm open as if he was holding something. Shiro honestly doesn’t know what that meant, what that image wanted to tell him, but for once, he doesn’t mind. He was privy to something beautiful, something miraculous and he has learned to be content with that.   
  
Across, Akira raises his eyes and asks one final question. “Do you trust me?”   
  
Shiro doesn’t even hesitate. “Yes.”   
  
Even with the faint trickle of fear in his head, Shiro doesn’t move, doesn’t call out a warning, doesn’t do anything as Akira raises his own hand and slowly — but firmly — places his over Shiro’s.   
  
Shiro gasps, eyes wide as warmth pulsates from the moment Akira’s skin touches him. Warmth unlike anything he has ever felt pours forth from their linked hands, and ignite his veins in threads of bright flames.   
  
For every moment he has felt lonely, for every moment he has felt insignificant and lost, for every moment that he has stood — in a dark alley, in the quiet of his room, sitting against a cold window in a nameless café — for every moment that he had felt that he was traipsing the line between what was real and what was not, for every moment that he had disappeared, for every moment that he had existed with regret — the warmth pushes them back, washing him in a comforting torrent of hope.   
  
All the times he had to ask himself if he had made the right choice, his regrets and his memories — they’re all forgotten, inundated in a burning lance of flame so strong, Shiro trembled to behold.   
  
Bright light explodes in his vision, and Shiro hears Keith say his name.   
  


* * *

  
He hears the ringing of an alarm and Shiro opens his eyes.   
  
A white ceiling greets his vision and when Shiro sits up, he feels the cool wind of the stand-up fan against his cheek. The curtains sway, and filtered light seep into the room. He takes in the room, and he realizes with a faint hint of pleasure — it’s his bedroom, in his home in Toyama. There’s the same brown door, the same rickety cabinet standing against the wall. He looks down and sees the same light-blue color of his bedsheet, the same messy white walls, the old-looking tiles. It’s his bedroom. He’s home.   
  
On steady legs, Shiro stands and walks to the window. It even has the same pale curtains. Grasping one end, Shiro pulls it back. He looks out the window, and sees never-ending, infinite white. He looks around, sees the same encompassing white. There is nothing else but the white. He shifts the curtain back home.   
  
Shiro walks to the door and holding the knob — feeling its slight coolness — and Shiro pauses. The weight in his hand is heavy, and he feels a slight hesitation in his action.   
  
Are you sure?   
  
Yes, he thinks. He believes.   
  
It’s not a voice, but more of an idea. An amalgam of thought.   
  
He doesn’t ask what he’s ready for, just that he is.   
  
Something far fainter than a memory calls to him, and Shiro chances a look back.   
  
He sees darkness, overloading, and overwhelming darkness.   
  
Pitch-black darkness that promises no return, no escape. It feels like it’s calling to him, tempting him back into it. In the darkness, Shiro feels security. He feels a promise to keep him safe, a promise to always be safe, an Eden from his fears.   
  
Are you ready now?   
  
It comes by again, and Shiro almost thinks it sounds like his own voice.   
  
He braves one more look at the darkness, like a crying monstrosity that tempts him with false promises and he looks away.   
  
“Yes.” He says, aloud and sure.   
  
He turns the knob and pulls the door back, easily moving in its hinges. He blinks, eyes wide and then he blinks again, unable to stop himself from smiling so hard, his mouth hurts.   
  
“I’ve been waiting.” Keith says.   
  
Light flashes.   
  


* * *

  
Shiro opens his eyes.   
  
He’s still in the same place he was with Akira — except, there is no Akira. He turns his gaze around, seeing not a single trace of the man, of the stranger that had become so important, so close to Shiro’s heart in the span of a night. Yet, in spite of not knowing where the other had gone, Shiro doesn’t feel afraid.   
  
He feels okay. He feels alright.   
  
He feels the thrum of possibility in his veins.   
  
Shiro feels a weight in his hands and he looks down.   
  
There, in the center of his palm (something impossible, something miraculous), almost as big as his thumbnail — a symbol of purity, of beauty, of hope, of rebirth — her faint, pink-tipped petals slowly letting him peek at her golden core, was a small lotus flower.   
  
And he feels, more than hears, a voice. It sounds calm, steady and tender. It sounds awfully like Akira.   
  
_ To be honest, I’ve always believed in magic. _   
  
Shiro smiles, then chuckles then he laughs aloud, his voice echoing in the early morning. He lets himself laugh, lets himself exhale all his relief, his joy, his happiness into the silent air. When he has stopped, he looks at the flower in his hand and he thinks.   
  
More an action of thought than thought itself.   
  
The flower remains in his hand after, and Shiro smiles.   
  


* * *

  
  
Reality is unique.  
  
How do you define reality? How do you define it from non-reality?  
  
What makes you sure that what you are going through, everything that you are feeling — your ideas, hopes and dreams — the summation of all your experiences, what makes you so sure that they are real?  
  
Perhaps. Perhaps the answer to the question is to leave it unanswered. Perhaps, it is the search of the answer that is the answer. Perhaps, in journeying for that one answer, you realize that some things in this reality are not meant to be answered, and you can be content with that.  
  
And perhaps — sometimes, in the most finicky of ways — reality answers you itself. To humans, in the understanding of a mind too limited to entertain the overwhelming infinity of possibility, it is nothing short of a miracle.  
  
And as existence, oftentimes called destiny, fate and other names humanity has called her over the endless cycle of time, often looks on at her creation, and notices a gaping hole in the form of a lonely, too lonely human in her fabric of harmony — sometimes all it takes is a little talk, and she chooses a name.  
  
  
  
  
  
In the glass window next to a nameless café, a form flickers into corporeality. A short man, bundled in a coat, with lilac-mauve eyes and a dark fringe. His name is Akira — for that one night, he exists.  
  


* * *

  
The studio was exactly how he imagined it would look like after years of absence - the same vinyl floors, the same off-white paint on the walls and Shiro looks up, smiling to himself as he watches the blades of the same rickety fan rotate, the familiar whir giving off almost no ventilation whatsoever. The receptionist is different, Seido isn't around it seems. He wonders how the younger man would look like now, and he files that for another day, another time (he has plenty of it). When he enters one of the old dance studios, flocks of memories hit him, gently, carefully, lovingly. He remembers kissing Keith against the sill of the door, smiling into the dancer's lips. He remembers trying (and failing) to follow Keith’s self-made choreography, content to watch his boyfriend from the side. He recalls each memory fondly, cherishing the happiness they had brought him once - and maybe, someday soon, he'll learn to move on.   
  
Shiro opens the door, itching to go home — maybe buy dinner for himself on the way, and he’d probably end up eating it in the living room, eyes glued to the television — he’s so distracted by his thoughts, he doesn’t notice the other person making his way down the hall of the studio.   
  
He catches sight a second before they collide, and he grabs the other person’s shoulder.   
  
Dark purple eyes look up at him in surprise, fringe resting against a sweat-dotted forehead.   
  
His name is Keith.   
  
And Shiro falls in love, all over again.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyhow, this all started from the general idea of facing things as they are, and not running away every time you're scared that somehow turned into a metaphor for acceptance and the often fortuitous circumstance of the things you lost finding their way back to you unexpectedly.
> 
> This is utterly self-indulgent and letting my contrived, convoluted Japanese pop-lit loving self out.


End file.
